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Innovative Solutions towards Autonomous Modular Facade Systems

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A special issue of Energies (ISSN 1996-1073). This special issue belongs to the section "A1: Smart Grids and Microgrids".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (15 December 2021) | Viewed by 10954

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Special Issue Editors

Dr. Iakovos T. Michailidis

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Guest Editor

1. Information Technologies Institute, Centre for Research and Technology Hellas, 6th km Charilaou-Thermi Road, 57001 Thessaloniki, Greece
2. Electrical and Computer Engineering Department, Democritus University of Thrace, University Campus Kimmeria, 67100 Xanthi, Greece
Interests: energy management systems; demand response strategies; artificial intelligence; load scheduling and control; energy consumption balancing; energy efficient indoor climating; integrated micro-grid management

Dr. Hu Du

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Guest Editor

Welsh School of Architecture, Cardiff University, Cardiff CF10 3NB, UK
Interests: modular façade; building-integrated renewables; building performance modelling; building performance evaluation; weather data and climate change; big data for buildings and cities

Prof. Simone Baldi

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Guest Editor

1. Delft Center for Systems and Control (DCSC), Delft University of Technology (TU Delft), 2628 CD Delft, The Netherlands
2. Jiangsu Provincial Key Lab of Networked Collective Intelligence, Southeast University (SEU), Nanjing 210096, China
Interests: adaptive and learning systems; smart buildings; demand response; heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) control

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

To achieve greenhouse gas emission targets by 2050, the collective efforts in carbon reduction and renewable energy generation are needed to decarbonise the existing building stock. Autonomous Modular Facade Systems (AMFS) offer a combined function of thermal insulation and energy harvesting. They have been proven capable of providing the necessary capacity to guarantee long-term self-sustainability in large scale, mostly commercial buildings. However, exploiting their maximum potential is strongly depending on the dynamics of the system and the occurring - usually emerging - occupancy and weather conditions during their operation.

Traditional building renovation usually focused on adjusting the U-values and the insulation of the building creating a thermally reinforced but static envelopment, which could not adapt to emergent dynamics beyond what initially have been designed. Modern innovative renovation trends have diverged towards considering active energy generating systems as structural / construction elements in essence which are passively driven by the occurring conditions in a non-reactive, open-loop manner; resulting in some extreme weather cases even poorer efficiency than before. A systematic approach needs to be taken to address architectural requirements, such as, orientation, weight, the depth of new façade, the dimension of frame grid, fixing, colour and texture of the outer layer; as well as emerging requirements during operation, such as, proactive energy management, flexibility management, cyber-attack sustainability, reliability and fault-tolerance which need to adapt to the needs of occupants, type of usage, local climate conditions, building typology, etc.

This Special Issue aims at stimulating the exchange of ideas and knowledge on closing-the-loop and creating active facade systems that can be easily adapted to different operational and structural cases during all three renovation phases (i.e., designing, installation and operation). To this purpose, original contributions containing theoretical and experimental research, case studies or comprehensive state of art discussions are welcome for possible publication.

Relevant topics to this special issue include, but are not limited to the following:

reactive management and control systems
flexibility-driven demand response
secure and shielded building management systems
reliable and fault tolerant microgrid operation
modular facade systems
integrated facade technologies
solar facade system
energy sustainable buildings
tool or software to support active façade design and development
seamless and non-disruptive renovation
innovative business modelling strategies

We very much looking forward to receiving your contribution to these important topics.

Dr. Iakovos T. Michailidis
Dr. Hu Du
Prof. Simone Baldi
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Energies is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

modular facade systems
integrated facade technologies
sustainable and circular facade systems
autonomous/reactive micro-grids
demand response
proactive energy management

Published Papers (4 papers)

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Research

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24 pages, 1536 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Integration and Verification of PLUG-N-HARVEST ICT Platform for Intelligent Management of Buildings

by Christos Korkas, Asimina Dimara, Iakovos Michailidis, Stelios Krinidis, Rafael Marin-Perez, Ana Isabel Martínez García, Antonio Skarmeta, Konstantinos Kitsikoudis, Elias Kosmatopoulos, Christos-Nikolaos Anagnostopoulos and Dimitrios Tzovaras

Energies 2022, 15(7), 2610; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/en15072610 - 02 Apr 2022

Cited by 6 | Viewed by 2115

Abstract

THe energy-efficient operation of microgrids—a localized grouping of consuming loads (domestic appliances, EVs, etc.) with distributed energy sources such as solar photovoltaic panels—suggests the deployment of Energy Management Systems (EMSs) that enable the actuation of controllable microgrid loads coupled with Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools. Such tools are capable of optimizing the aggregated performance of the microgrid in an automated manner, based on an extensive network of Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI). Modular adaptable/dynamic building envelope (ADBE) solutions have been proven an effective solution—exploiting free façade areas instead of roof areas—for extending the thermal inertia and energy harvesting capacity in existing buildings of different nature (residential, commercial, industrial, etc.). This study presents the PLUG-N-HARVEST holistic workflow towards the delivery of an automatically controllable microgrid integrating active ADBE technologies (e.g., PVs, HVACs). The digital platform comprises cloud AI services and functionalities for energy-efficient management, data healing/cleansing, flexibility forecasting, and the security-by-design IoT to efficiently optimize the overall performance in near-zero energy buildings and microgrids. The current study presents the effective design and necessary digital integration steps towards the PLUG-N-HARVEST ICT platform alongside real-life verification test results, validating the performance of the platform. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Innovative Solutions towards Autonomous Modular Facade Systems)

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25 pages, 5098 KiB

Open AccessEditor’s ChoiceArticle

Enabling Optimal Energy Management with Minimal IoT Requirements: A Legacy A/C Case Study

by Panagiotis Michailidis, Paschalis Pelitaris, Christos Korkas, Iakovos Michailidis, Simone Baldi and Elias Kosmatopoulos

Energies 2021, 14(23), 7910; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/en14237910 - 25 Nov 2021

Cited by 7 | Viewed by 1825

Abstract

The existing literature on energy saving focuses on large-scale buildings, wherein the energy-saving potential is substantially larger than smaller-scale buildings. However, the research intensity is significantly less for small-scale deployments and their capacities to regulate energy use individually, directly and without depreciating users’ comfort and needs. The current research effort focused on energy saving and user satisfaction, concerning a low-cost—yet technically sophisticated—methodology for controlling conventional residential HVAC units through cheap yet reliable actuation and sensing and auxiliary IoT equipment. The basic ingredients of the proposed experimental methodology involve a conventional A/C unit, an Arduino microcontroller, typical wireless IoT sensors and actuators, a configured graphical environment and a sophisticated, model-free, optimization-and-control algorithm (PCAO) that portrays the ground basis for achieving improved performance results in comparison with conventional methods. The main goal of this study was to produce a system that would adequately and expeditiously achieve energy savings by utilizing minimal hardware/equipment (affordability). The system was designed to be easily expandable in terms of new units or thermal equipment (expandability) and also to be autonomous, requiring zero user interventions at the experimental site (automation). The real-life measurements were collected over two different seasonal periods of the year (winter, summer) and concerned a conventional apartment in the city of Xanthi, Northern Greece, where summers and winters exhibit quite diverse climate characteristics. The final results revealed the increased efficiency of PCAO’s optimization in comparison with a conventional rule-based control strategy (RBC), as concerns energy savings and user satisfaction. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Innovative Solutions towards Autonomous Modular Facade Systems)

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21 pages, 4479 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Model Predictive Control for the Energy Management in a District of Buildings Equipped with Building Integrated Photovoltaic Systems and Batteries

by Maria C. Fotopoulou, Panagiotis Drosatos, Stefanos Petridis, Dimitrios Rakopoulos, Fotis Stergiopoulos and Nikolaos Nikolopoulos

Energies 2021, 14(12), 3369; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/en14123369 - 08 Jun 2021

Cited by 9 | Viewed by 2362

Abstract

This paper introduces a Model Predictive Control (MPC) strategy for the optimal energy management of a district whose buildings are equipped with vertically placed Building Integrated Photovoltaic (BIPV) systems and Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS). The vertically placed BIPV systems are able to cover larger areas of buildings’ surfaces, as compared with conventional rooftop PV systems, and reach their peak of production during winter and spring, which renders them suitable for energy harvesting especially in urban areas. Driven by both these relative advantages, the proposed strategy aims to maximize the district’s autonomy from the external grid, which is achieved through the cooperation of interactive buildings. Therefore, the major contribution of this study is the management and optimal cooperation of a group of buildings, each of which is equipped with its own system of vertical BIPV panels and BESS, carried out by an MPC strategy. The proposed control scheme consists of three main components, i.e., the forecaster, the optimizer and the district, which interact periodically with each other. In order to quantitatively evaluate the benefits of the proposed MPC strategy and the implementation of vertical BIPV and BESS, a hypothetical five-node distribution network located in Greece for four representative days of the year was examined, followed by a sensitivity analysis to examine the effect of the system configuration on its performance. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Innovative Solutions towards Autonomous Modular Facade Systems)

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Review

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28 pages, 2073 KiB

Open AccessReview

State of the Art of Technologies in Adaptive Dynamic Building Envelopes (ADBEs)

by Negar Mohtashami, Nico Fuchs, Maria Fotopoulou, Panagiotis Drosatos, Rita Streblow, Tanja Osterhage and Dirk Müller

Energies 2022, 15(3), 829; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/en15030829 - 24 Jan 2022

Cited by 11 | Viewed by 3767

Abstract

The design of adaptive façades as complex systems that dynamically respond to weather conditions and occupants’ demands is rapidly increasing in modern constructions since they are highly energy efficient. Adaptive Dynamic Building Envelopes (ADBEs) exploit the benefits of technologies that manage the energy and mass transfer between building and outdoor environments actively and selectively. There is a wide range of technologies used in the design of ADBEs that differ from one another in terms of user controllability and the level of how active or passive their technologies are. This paper provides a systematic search in literature on the technologies devised in the ADBEs, specifying the most prevalent practices, and highlights the most cutting-edge research approximations. The analysis shows more than half of the studies use photovoltaics (PVs) in their design. Using mechanical ventilation and heat pumps were the next popular choices. Moreover, approximately half of the studies were carried out using simulation methods alone, whereas only 13% of studies couple simulations with experimental work. This highlights a clear gap in coupling digital modeling and simulation software with practical field testing and successful mass production. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Innovative Solutions towards Autonomous Modular Facade Systems)

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